


Acta Non Verba

by DrellVerse



Series: Drell, Mass Effect, Among Other Sorties [5]
Category: Mass Effect
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-10
Updated: 2021-03-03
Packaged: 2021-03-08 19:06:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 2,240
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27491662
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DrellVerse/pseuds/DrellVerse
Summary: A tender moment between Thane and Shepard after the loss of Mordin Solus. In grief for a colleague, one must remember what it was they left in life, and not the void.
Series: Drell, Mass Effect, Among Other Sorties [5]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2009026
Comments: 1
Kudos: 8





	1. Acta Non Verba

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A tender moment between Thane and Shepard after the loss of Mordin Solus. In grief for a colleague, one must remember what it was they left in life, and not the void.

"Requiem, inebriavi animam lassam, et ego vestrum adprehendet vos. No autem non in potest enim diu perdidi."  
"What does that mean?"  
"Rest, weary soul, and I will find you. We will not be lost for long. And in my heart, I will guide you. . ."  
Thane held Shepard's head against his chest and let her grieve Mordin's death. Alone in the loft, he felt her shake and rub her face into the leather of his shoulder. Thinking it uncomfortable, he held her away and adjusted his coat, then unclasped the buckles to remove it completely.  
He leaned against the chair arm of the loveseat they were in, cradling her battle-hardened body as though she were a child, in one of her private moments of weakness.  
"Sshh," he hushed her, trilling comfortingly from the base of his throat, "let it go. You need this."  
If ever there were a time, now it must come.  
"I tried, Thane," she sobbed, trailing into a whisper. "I tried."  
At first he did not say anything, only leading a wisp of hair onto her face and then tucking it carefully behind her ear. Pressing his lips to her forehead, he thought of his own personal losses, and knew for her there would be hope. "The good doctor made a decision, one that he will have died happy with, and that, you should be grateful for him. Not many are given the chance to correct their mistakes. To live to see it through and die is the ultimate sacrifice, but he made his amends before he left."  
"And he chose how to go."  
Thane hummed into her whisper, rocking his chin against her temple. "Maybe he will save a place for you on that distant shore where he said he would collect sea shells for analysis."  
Shepard chortled and snorted under his neck, and Thane smiled and huffed out dry laughter that was his real humor.  
"If he doesn't grind them all up into cannon fodder first."  
She pushed off his chest and stared steady into his eyes. Thane gripped her arms and held her still as he kissed her, letting her grief flow into his love. There was nothing else he could do to comfort her. She was hurting. Yet there was still a battle to fight, a war to win.  
Men and women to lead.  
Him to love.  
Life would go on without Mordin, but more importantly, so would all the lives he had promised. His last desperate, selfless act, to make those lives possible.  
So what if there were a few too many krogan babies running rampant in the universe? His siha would be able to see, at least one day Thane hoped, that Mordin was still with them. The impact of his conscience, his life, resonating in spaces even where there was no air to breathe.


	2. The Valley of Life

_Woe be to those who walk the valley of life and see not the walls threatening to cave in._

_When Moses set forth through the spreading waters, did he not fear their crashing down?_

_Our souls are but walking, strong, fearless, determined, and the age of one's spirit grows as does the body and mind, until we are so feeble, the valley of death, that is life, becomes our resting ground, as we, paper thin, may no longer set forth another foot into the slipping sands of time._

_May others go ahead of us, and walk this valley of life, as ever onward it goes, endless._

_Each. . . Step. . . Forward._

_. . . Until our papers blow away. . ._

Gala Shepard, from ‘The Peace of Papillon’.


	3. The Death Café

Glass windows line the façade. A clean spartan café for sitting, dining on small meals and bites. Tea, hot beverages, some cold. No alcohol. Humans get up and walk out. Drell come in. Asari. Turian. A krogan stops by but does not stay. The door tingles with a little bell. The register opens, closes, loud, good for the shopkeep to hear, disturbing to the relative peace. Sweet smells concocted in back. A lone male comes in. White suit. Black crests. Gaunt, teal face. Full lips like a movie star. Hooked nose, an unconventional beauty. It sits well with his face. He goes to the counter, orders, waits. She is there. In the corner. Waiting. Red hair. Blue eyes. Freckles. An innocence about her. Glass on each side.

Vivid memory of their kissing.

Disappears in the blink of an eye.

She tucks the hair behind her ear. Nervous? Her face tilts up.

“Hi.”

“Hey.”

He sits down across from her.

“Is this where we grieve?” he asks.

She nods, then shakes her head. “It’s not quite like that.”

It’s a long bridge. Beautiful. Strong. Arches. One of the manmade wonders. What can the mind conceive. . . It was under there they made love. Against a column. Against each other. This hurt. Their pain. Idle memories.

He walked there, holding her hand. There were doves. There were people. He dressed in white, she in blue. The sky was lighter than her dress. A bike came through with a pedaler, and they let go to let him by. He reunited with her, putting his arm over her shoulder, she around his waist, squeezing tight. They walked the bridge together, heads in the sky.

She looked at him across the table.

As the waiter walked by, he disappeared.

She looked down, pinched her brow and temple and wept onto her paper.

Obsidian eyes of light. They took her with them.

The seat in the corner of the café was full then empty. She flickered, head in her hand against it. There and gone. The café remained busy, but no one noticed they had left separately, and not come in together.

People walked outside the café, nothing going on. Just another day on the Citadel. Just like any other.

An empty apartment. Light bars on the wall and sofa. A cramped, stuffy little place in terms of warmth. No one came. No one entered.


	4. The Death Café 2

The blue eyes dodged left, red brow slanting downward. The café was busy today, humans walking along the glass display in front of the counter and registers. Small grey tables lined in perfect rows, one following another. Glass windows spanning the wall extended right the corner and left, spanning from metal ground to black grilled ceiling. Blue fingers, striped with wild black, skimmed the tables, leaping from one to the other, landing, trailing all the way until he turned left.

“Hi.” He smiled down at her, blue face and black markings, a cool cream colored suit as light as his demeanor. Red hair tilted back, pale brow up to the ceiling. Fingers tapped, long manicured nails, against the pale ceramic mug, held hiding her nose and smile. The eyes tilted upwards, laughing. He sat, blocking view of her. It was here they enjoyed their day, together, alone and not, happy and relaxed.

Not much later, he was making love to her again, vigorous and enthusiastic about their new coupling. He held her against the column, wearing his nice suit, pants around his ankles, her ankles around his lean, blue, tribally swiped waist. Palms to the concrete, free to their own desire. Caught up in the heat of each other and the sun casting across her left cheek, his right. He gazed down, she up, lips red as violent rose, nose in tilt to the top of the bridge cover. Blue and black hands gripped the fabric of her hips, digging tight to hold her as he moved, countlessly. Hands to his neck, the back of blue black skin, his glossy gaze sought upward, mouth slowly opening in front of her.

 _Is this love?_ she thought.

_No, it’s only grief._

The apartment was empty at first, the sun barring through the window blinds’ slits. The varnished door opened. She came in, wearing dark blue sweater and skirt with red hair bright and fiery. He came in after, following her across the carpet, turning quickly to close and lock the door, stripping off his jacket and unbuckling his pants, going to her and backing her into the next room.

“Is this love?”

“No, it’s only grief.”

“Then why are you still here?”

He picked her up, knees bending around his hips, blue and black powerful arms hooped over thighs and cupping her hips to hold her high and place her back against the wall before the next room. Slow, grinding slow, so slow.

“We grieve together.”

 _This is where my fingers are. This is where your back arches. This is how your mouth feels. This is what it tastes like._ He held her, hot as fire, moving to fill and reach her very soul.

“Is this what love is?”

“I don’t know. . . But it feels good, don’t it?”

Making love against the wall in the light of a waning star, or just the world turning with them. As they are.

_We are fortunate lovers in time so hard. Hold me. Hold me. Don’t let go. Don’t let go of me._

“I need to know.”

“If you love me?”

“I need to know.”

“That I’m sorry?”

“Will you let me go?”

“Never.”

“Take my hand then. Let’s go for a walk.”

Together, they left the apartment. Together, they disembarked. It was casual. It was solace. It was comfort where it needed to be. Whether physical or emotional or spiritual, it was where they needed to be. Alone, was just too painful. They needed love. They needed touch. To be touched. To be loved. To be held, and then fall asleep restfully in each other’s grief. _Arms to hold me. Arms to protect me. Arms to grieve with me. Lover. Lover. Friend._

“This is how we grieve.”

“It’s not easy, but it’s not so hard.”

“Grieve with me.”

“I will. . . I will. . .”

There were days when they were lonely. Days when they were sad. Remembering. . . Remembering could be so awful. It was better with a friend.

“It’s better with her.”

“It’s better with him.”

This they said to others, whispering gently on the sides. Would two mindful lovers be able to resist when the grieving was over?


	5. Isole

As the bed comes closer, the sick bed in the hospital room, hands of sun fall over it as if comforting he who is no longer there. The sheets are not changed, but they are crisp, warm still, used. There is no ping, no tick of the clock, no pulse on the meter beating on. The coils of fluid conveyance wind down and hang idle, not needed. The cabinets are closed, a lining cloth peeps out from a lower door and the floor is clear and sterile. The curtains around the bed are light blue, as is the comforting heat blanket. Joining the sunlight are her hands, feeling over the cloth, searching for some comfort in the thought that he was once there, laying in that bed. The hand pauses, curls up, brushing the side of heel palm against the cushion, smoothing out a wrinkle made by him. Wet dark marks appear next to the hand, and a shadow of her profile looms over these, looking aside.

The pillow has his smell, the dent of where his head and shoulders laid. The scene fades to black.

A flash of a glossy, eight-ball reminiscent blackness. A child’s piercing laugh of joy. Swings. Little blue fingers wrapped tight around silver and rust chains. A blue, pebbly eyelid closes and opens, lashless, yet almost human. Another pale pearl layer slides horizontally like doors closing underneath. Light reflects off the black lens.

Nothing.

The yard opens up. Flowers, red and yellow, line the white concrete of a walk path moving left and right beyond the garden bed. Grass, so rich and green and manicured. A thick, branching, heavy with leaf tree slanting right over the yard, providing shade if sun were too hot for our skin, our scales. Looking up, the sky is blue, slants of multicolored prisms from sunlight so strong pierce through our eyelashes. There is a single cloud, and I think of him. Watching down at me. Watching down at us.

Fade.

The water rushes up. Nongentle cliff crags rushing by beneath. Waves crest and splash against stones both jagged and smooth.

Traveling underwater after the chilling submergence, floating along with the current as it pulls away into the sea shelf, traveling down to the illuminated lights below, glowing green, pastel pink, purple, yellow, too countless to list.

She sits, blinks softly, dark hair wisping across her soft features. Knees under her chin, arms wrapped around her shins, dress skirt blowing beneath her hands and elbows. Seated on grass at the curve of a high cliff, remaining there as we fly outwards, watching her, waiting. A house on the top of the hill. Simple, elegant, big. Smoke coming from the chimney. Wind carrying us farther away.

Dark eyes, hooded green brow, slowly lifting. The light appears on his brow and face and lips.

The stars above in empty black space, but filled with something waiting. Arcing down towards a blue planet swirled and wreathing with white fast moving clouds. Lightning flashes, illuminating the web. A thunder rumbles, and yet cannot be heard, only witnessed and felt.

Breaking through a door way, green and black, eyes cold and delivering those it sees into their own final darkness before they have a chance to shout.

Blue armor, long gun, avian eyes listing right along the channel of scope.


End file.
